Qaradawi Condemns Violent Cartoon Protests
CAIRO, February 6, 2006 - Prominent Muslim scholar Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi denounced on Sunday, February 5, sabotage and violent protests by Muslims over the publication of cartoons mocking Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) by several European newspapers, saying Muslims should vent anger prudently.

"The sabotage done by some Muslims in some [Arab] capitals in response to the offensive cartoons is unacceptable and should be denounced," Qaradawi, who heads the Dublin-based International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) told Al-Jazeera's Shari`ah and Life program.

"We never call on people to set fire to cars, but to express their anger in a prudent manner to head off serious consequences," said the prominent scholar.

"True that Islam has been the subject of attacks recently, but Muslims should not reciprocate."

Qaradawi further strongly condemned the attack on a church in the Lebanese capital Beirut by a Muslim mob.

"It seems as if some opportunists are behind these attacks just to add fuel to the already raging flames," he said.

Muslims protesting against the cartoons set fire to the Danish consulate in Beirut on Sunday and Syrian protesters did the same with the Danish and Norwegian embassies in Damascus a day earlier.

Muslim scholars, organizations and leaders were united Sunday in condemning the violent attacks against the embassies.

Twelve cartoons, first published last September by Denmark's mass-circulation Jyllands-Posten and then reprinted by several European dailies, have caused an uproar in the Muslim world.

Effective Boycott

Qaradawi said boycotting the products of European countries whose dailies had published the blasphemous cartoons is the Muslims' sharpest weapon.

"We called on Muslims to boycott their products in response and pressed for an international resolution criminalizing any insult to any religion," he said.

A cohort of Muslim dignitaries and organizations have called for the enactment of an international law banning the publication of any insults to religious symbols and values.

The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) and the Arab League, the Muslim world's two main political bodies, are seeking a UN resolution, backed by possible sanctions, to protect religions following the publication of provocative cartoons.

Friday Sermons Berate Cartoons, Urge Action

CAIRO, February 3, 2006 - Muslim imams and scholars across the world were united Friday, February 3, in pressing for an apology over the blasphemous cartoons of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) published by European newspapers, calling for enacting legislations to protect religious sanctities and symbols as thousands of Muslims took to the streets in protest of the insulting caricatures.

"The Muslim nation must get angry over insults directed against its faith and Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and must not accept these affronts under any circumstances," prominent Muslim scholar Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi told prayers during the Friday sermon in Doha.

Last September, Denmark's Jyllands-Posten published twelve drawings that included portrayals of a man assumed to be the Prophet wearing a time-bomb shaped turban and showed him as a knife-wielding nomad flanked by shrouded women.

Several European newspapers, in the name of freedom of the press, reprinted some or all of the blasphemous cartoons, including the French daily France-Soir and Germany's Die Welt.

Boycott

Qaradawi called for economic and political boycott of countries that printed the insulting drawings.

"It is a fundamental duty of the Muslim nation to boycott goods of those who dared to insult Prophet Muhammad (PBUH)."

"The Muslim governments should also withdraw their ambassadors from Denmark and shut down its embassies on their territories as part of a political boycott."

The Muslim scholar also called for issuing legislations to protect prophets and religious sanctities against any form of insults.

"The Muslim countries and people should pressure the international bodies to issue these laws."

"They should also pressure newspapers that insulted Muslims to apologize.

"Danish Muslims should also be allowed to publish articles in the newspapers for a whole month to defend our Prophet."

Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Friday he could not apologize for the publication of the cartoons, Reuters reported.

"A Danish government can never apologize on behalf of a free and independent newspaper," Rasmussen told reporters after an hour-long meeting with 76 foreign diplomats.

Commenting on a boycott of Danish goods in Muslim countries, Rasmussen said defending freedom was more important than defending his country's business interests.

New Spirit

Preacher Saleh bin Humaid, who gave the Friday sermon at the Grand Mosque in the holy city of Makkah, said a new spirit of defiance has been breathed among Muslims after the worldwide protests over the cartoons.

"A great new spirit is flowing through the body of the Islamic nation ... this world can no longer ignore this nation and its feelings," he was quoted as saying in a televised sermon by Reuters.

"The nation has fought to back its Prophet Muhammad in recent days. It is the right of every Muslim to show joy at this defense of our beloved Prophet."

Saudi Arabia withdrew its ambassador from Denmark last month, saying the Danish government had not done enough to assuage anger over the drawings.

Massive Protests
 
The reproduction of the insulting caricatures has triggered massive fury across the Muslim world, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.

Thousands of angry Muslims demonstrated at Al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam's third holiest shrine, after Friday prayers. Demonstrators shouted slogans against Denmark, Norway and France, some of the countries in which the offending cartoons have been published.

In Iraq, hundreds of Iraqis after Friday prayers burnt flags and products of Denmark and Norway in protest against the insulting drawings.

"There is only one God ... and Mohammed is his prophet," chanted nearly 250 protesting Iraqis in Fallujah.

In Egypt's Al Azhar Mosque, hundreds of Egyptian worshippers protested the drawings after the Friday prayers, calling for a boycott of products of European countries that produced the blasphemous cartoons.

The protestors carried banners calling on Arab and Islamic countries to withdraw ambassadors from Denmark and other countries that reprinted the drawings.

"They insulted Prophet Muhammad and a billion of Muslims," one of the female protestors told IslamOnline.net.

"These insults contradict with their claims of free thinking and thought they have long propagated," she added, waving a banner reading "No to Western Racism".

Massive protests were also staged in other Egyptian governorates in protest of the drawings.

In the coastal city of Alexandria, thousands of Egyptians took to the streets after Friday prayers, condemning the anti-Prophet campaigns in the West. The demonstrators also burnt flags of Denmark and other countries that printed the cartoons.

In Turkey, Turkish protestors denounced the blasphemous cartoons and burnt the French and Danish flags.

In the country's biggest city Istanbul, some 200 protestors laid a black wreath in front of the Danish consulate in the city's European side and pelted the consulate's signboard with eggs.

"We warn you, do not play with our patience," read banners carried by members of the group, watched closely by riot police.

In Diyarbakir, the regional capital of the mainly Kurdish southeast, some 70 people gathered in front of the city's main mosque, chanting slogans against European countries where newspapers have published the offending cartoons.

In Pakistan, hundreds of protestors in major cities burned flags and chanted "Death to Denmark, France and Norway".

In East African countries, Muslims vented outrage during and after Friday prayers at the insulting cartoons, AFP said.

In mosques on Tanzania's overwhelmingly Muslim Zanzibar archipelago and in predominantly Muslim Somalia, imams and worshippers denounced the drawings as offensive and insulting attacks by western media on Islam and Muslims.

"The enemies of Islam are using editors to publish articles to tarnish Islam and insult the prophet," Abdullah Hussein, the imam at the main Jibril Mosque in Stone Town, told the faithful congregation.

In Mogadishu, Somalia, several hundred Muslims protested against the cartoons.

"What is the value of living when your prophet is insulted by a dirty journalist paid to be a religious extremist?" asked protestor Ahmed Sheikh Mukhtar. "We hate western journalists."

In Kenya, the imam at Nairobi's central mosque said the cartoons were a "serious problem" that the country's Islamic leaders would soon address. 

On the freedom of expression argument often used for publishing the cartoons, Qaradawi said blasphemy "has nothing to do with freedom of expression, which is not absolute..there are limits that should not be stretched."

A number of European newspapers have said press freedom was more important than the protests and boycotts they have provoked.

Many Arab commentators have said that defense rang hollow because, they said, European media shield Judaism and Israel from criticism.


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